Last Resort: Chronicles of a Pack
by Walks Two Paths
Summary: Follows the adventures of a pack of Garou and Bastet. Should be rated 'R' for graphic depictions of violence, mature themes, and language, but I'm not getting the feedback that I need with an 'R' rating.
1. Author's Notes

Author's Notes

            "Werewolf: the Apocalypse" is a registered trademark of White Wolf Publishing, Inc.   Nearly all of the supernatural aspects of this story are property of White Wolf, and I am only using them to tell a story, not to make money, so any potential lawsuit is unfounded.  

            The main characters in this story are my packmates' and my creations, and the storyline is loosely based on our  role-playing sessions. The enemies, situations, and abilities contained herein can be explained in greater detail in any of the "Werewolf: the Apocalypse" texts, or at www.whitewolf.com.  

            Please, feel free to read and review, although you most certainly do not have to if you do not wish to do so.  All reviews are appreciated.  Thank you very much for your time, and I hope you enjoy this current work-in-progress.

Walks Two Paths


	2. Prelude: The Rage Awakens

Last Resort 

Korrinda Taylor

(Based on the game "Werewolf: The Apocalypse" by White Wolf)

Volume One Gathering the Pack 

Prelude: The Rage Awakens

            Lyrica Grey took one final drag of her cigarette before finally spitting it out and grinding it into smoky ashes under her heel.  Checking the time again on her watch, as if in disbelief that it actually _was two o'clock in the morning, she swore under her breath and then began her short walk home through the streets and back alleys of the city of Necropolis, in the state of Washington.  Lyrica knew she was going to be in trouble even before she got there, and that there was precious little she could do about it.  _

            "Well, maybe not," she said out loud, as though someone heard her and cared, "Maybe Mom and Frank both got drunk after work again, and forgot about me.  Maybe in their alcohol-soaked minds, I don't exist anymore."  She shook her head, her short black hair whipping about her face and stinging her cheeks.  

"Ha!  Not likely, but a nice thought, Lyrica."  She sighed, and wrapped her trench coat tighter about her small frame to block out the cold she felt seeping into her insides, the cold she always felt when thinking about her stepfather, Frank Rosenberg.  Lyrica did not even know the name of her real father.  Her mother, Margie Grey (now Margie Rosenberg), had gotten drunk at a party one night in New Orleans (Lyrica's mother was a heavy partier before Lyrica was born), and woke up the next morning in some person's bed; the owner of the bed was not even home, so her mother had left.  Nine months later, Lyrica Margeaux Grey came into the world.  

Even before her daughter was born, Margie was a heavy drinker, alcohol being her only constant companion.  By the age of three, under the supervision of the neighbor's six-year-old son, Lyrica had learned how to cook dishes such as macaroni and cheese and ramen for herself.  But, because of her mother's inability to hold a job, sometimes there was not even food in the house, only beer.  As Lyrica grew older, she found ways of getting money by doing odd jobs for the landlord and other tenants in the slummy apartments her mother and she lived in.  She also managed to figure out public transportation enough to get to the nearest school everyday.  When Lyrica was thirteen, she found work at a convenience store around the corner from her apartment.  Thirteen was an eventful year for her; it was the year she started smoking, and the year when her mother met Frank, at her first, and last, Alcoholics Anonymous meeting.  From that point onward, her life became even more of a hell.  Within a month, Frank had moved himself into their apartment, and convinced Margie to marry him.  Then the abuse started.  At first, it was small things: name-calling, smacks on the arm, things like that; but, over the course of a year, it had escalated in to full out beatings, especially after Frank had been drinking heavily.  Her mother did not care; she had never really cared what happened to Lyrica.  

Now at sixteen, Lyrica was searching for a way out.  From a young age, Lyrica felt that she was different from everyone else around her, as if she could, one day, see and do things that no one else could.  People, she felt, from her classmates to complete strangers that came into the store or that she passed on the street, avoided her because of this.  They acted as though she was not there or, if they had to interact with her, as if she were some unpleasant trifle that must be acknowledged before the individual could move on with their day.  Not that she cared, Lyrica would tell herself.  She was too strong of a person to let other people patronize her.  But (she would tell herself) on the other hand, it would be nice to have companionship.  Perhaps the one person who she thought would have understood her plight was her biological father, and he did not know that Lyrica Grey existed.  She often found herself gazing in the mirror, wondering what her real father would think of her, or if she looked like him.  Margie was a short brunette-dyed-blonde, with one of those unfortunate bulging figures, with fake-tanned skin that appeared to have been wound around her as if to keep whatever was inside from spilling out; not like Lyrica, whose was tall and willowy, with long arms and legs, and a slender build.  Her skin was very pale, almost unhealthy looking in its pigmentation, but it accentuated her dark red lips and the short, coal black hair that framed her face, cut bluntly at chin level.  Perhaps her most striking feature was her eyes, which were large and violet, with dark purple flecks in them, giving them a luminescent quality.  Altogether, Lyrica was a very pretty girl, who would probably be rather attractive in a few years.       

Lyrica climbed the last set of steps that led up to apartment 28B and apprehensively made her way down the dimly lit hall.  Fumbling in her coat pocket for her key, she took a few shaky breaths to calm herself and drew out the cold piece of metal that she needed to unlock the door.  

"Come on," she muttered under her breath, "Be asleep.  Please, _please_ be asleep."  She inserted the key into the lock, held her breath, and turned it.  Light spilled out from the door as it creaked open, revealing to all who cared to look the nauseating conditions of the personal prison that Lyrica called "home."  

The small front room, which was a combination living room and kitchen, was practically bare of furniture, save for a small table, with one whole chair and two broken chairs encircling it, in the kitchen section, and a rat-eaten recliner in the portion that served as a living room.  Half-drunken bottles containing a liquid of unknown (but undoubtedly dubious) origins were everywhere: here was one tipped on its side on a kitchen chair, spilling its alcoholic contents about, here was one on the floor, apparently with the same occupation as the first, here were several standing upright around the recliner, while two rats were using them to play a ratty version of the game "hide-and-seek."  Scattered among the minute glass monoliths were cigarette butts, many of which were still lit and burning, creating smoky holes on the threadbare orange carpet.  

The cigarette butts congregated in their greatest numbers around the recliner, whose sole purpose, at the moment, was to enthrone an enormously obese man.  When a baker mixes flour and salt and yeast and water to make the dough for bread and puts it in a warm place, it swells, growing white and soft and spongy.  The man in the chair had the appearance of undercooked bread, a great deal of undercooked bread.  _Moldy_ undercooked bread.  Every visible inch of skin had some form of hair sprouting from it, except for the peak of the head, which was severely lacking any type of growth.  The creak of the door opening had roused this creature from his spirits-induced stupor, his brown, currenty eyes peering out into the light from the rolls of flesh on his face, his gaze made lackluster and dull from the alcohol he had ingested that evening.  This lump of wasted, spongy human meat was Lyrica's stepfather, Frank Rosenberg.

            The awakened beast stumbled to his feet, adjusting his grip on the half-empty bottle he clutched in one beefy fist.  As he stood, Frank lurched unsteadily, as though he was not used to the all-encompassing force of gravity that had taken hold of his gelatinous mass.  Lyrica started to ease her way out the door, away from the drunken creature, but he surged forward in one swift movement (too swift, it would seem, for one his size), and procured a large amount of Lyrica's collar with the other fist.  Lyrica tried to wrench herself from his clutches, but Frank held fast, his size and weight being an obvious advantage over her.

            "Hold still, dammit!" Frank yelled the words, slurred and drunken.  Then, as if to convince his stepdaughter to cease in her struggles, he brought the bottle up to one side of his face, and then sent it careening down to Lyrica's.  The fragile glass container shattered on impact with Lyrica's cheek, sending shards of glass and drops of liquor in all directions like an alcoholic pipe bomb.  Much of the glass hit Lyrica, creating numerous incisions all over her exposed skin.  The force of impact tore her from her father's grip, sending her flying into a wall and then to the floor, where she lay cowering.  

"You little _bitch!  Making me an' your mother worry all night!  I oughta __kill you for that!"  Frank forced her to her feet, and then threw her to the other side of the room.  Lyrica reached out with one hand to try to stop herself from slamming into another wall, the wall that stood between the front room and her parents' room, but to no avail.  She came down hard; all the pressure from her falling body focused onto her wrist, which snapped from the weight, the ragged bone ends nearly forcing themselves through the delicate layer of skin that encased them.  Crying out in the agony that comes with pain like that, Lyrica pulled herself to her feet, protecting her injured arm with the cupped palm of her other hand.  Her breath was greedily sucked into her body with ragged gasps; sweat drenched her face.  She was petrified with fear, frozen against her parents' bedroom door._

The door behind her suddenly opened, pushing Lyrica forward onto her knees.  Out of the gaping maw of darkness came a lone figure, Lyrica's mother, her brain raw and fuzzy from the night's drinking.  Ignoring the scene spread before her eyes, Margie Rosenberg half walked, half stumbled toward the kitchen table, and immediately began searching for some drop of alcohol to consume.  Incredulous and disbelieving, Lyrica stared up at her mother, searching for some type of motherly instinct that would come to protect her.  The knowledge that nothing could (or would) save her slammed full force into her mind.  This flash of insight revealed the thing that she had always known: no one loved Lyrica Grey enough to care about her.  Not her classmates, her employer, her stepfather, or even her own mother.

 Fear, a different type of fear, more primal than the one she had felt only moments before, coursed through her body.  But along with that fear came rage, an overwhelming kind of rage that turned her blood into white-hot molten steel, and that filled her mind with a venom seldom rivaled.  Lyrica's only thought, the only thing she could see, was the hate of the one person that should care for her: her mother.  And this snapped her self-control like a frail twig.

She spoke softly at first, but her words quickly increased in volume until she was screaming at Margie; at Frank; at everyone she had ever known who had pushed her aside and ignored her:          

            "…damn…you….  Damn…you.  Damn you.  Damn you!  _Damn _you!  _Damn you!  DAMN YOU!  DAMN!  YOU!"  _Fists clenched, she lunged at Frank from across the room with a speed that should have been impossible for a human to reach by simply running.  Halfway to him, Lyrica launched herself off of the ground with a simple push of her legs.  In midair was when it happened, when Lyrica ascended into something more.  Her blood turned to fire, coursing through her veins on the wave of euphoric rancor that filled her mind.  The physical change began with the extremities, the arms and legs.  They grew longer, more muscled, the sinews tightening and constricting as if they were tensing for the kill.  There was a short, painful, burning sensation in her legs, as the bones rearranged themselves under the new growths of muscle, and then it was quieted.  Next, her ribs and spinal cord rounded out her torso, and also built more muscle onto it.  The end of her spinal cord pushed itself through the skin, with a feeling that may have bordered on painful before it was over, and created a long, thin tail.  Her hands and feet tightened, fingers and toes shortening slightly, becoming more blunted, the thumbs of her hands moving farther up her arm. Four razor-sharp claws tore through the skin on the tips of her fingers.  Lyrica threw her head back in a cry that would have shattered pure crystal as her skull mutated, the jawbone and upper mouth growing out, becoming more muzzle-like.  Her open mouth provided observers with a spectacular view of her teeth as they also grew, canines wickedly curving into fangs.  Whiskers sprouted on either side of her face, each sensitive quill acknowledging a thousand different sensations imperceptible to humankind.  Up the line of her jaw to her ears came a tingling feeling, like fire ants had been turned loose underneath her skin in those areas, then Lyrica's ears pulled themselves up to the crown of her head, concurrently stretching themselves into taller, pointed shapes.  For the final touch, pure midnight-black fur sprouted from every pore in her skin, the hair follicles forming a sleek raven armature around the sinewy mass that Lyrica had become.  

            The whole ordeal had taken less than a fraction of a millisecond, and, at the same time, taken more than a lifetime to complete the transformation from abandoned, abused waif to an unrivaled, unstoppable, Raging feline machine-of-destruction.  A cat warrior. A werecat.  A Bastet, in full Crinos form, bent on accomplishing the single thought emblazoned on her feral, Rage-filled mind: _DESTROY.              _

            With one swipe of her paw, she ripped Frank's head of his shoulders and onto the floor, trailing blood and entrails behind it, that look of fear and Delirium frozen forever on its countenance.  The body collapsed onto the floor, the red plasma gushing from the stump of the neck onto the floor, staining the carpet crimson; a great deal of blood, for Frank was a large man.  Lyrica tore at the body with her sharp claws, ragged gashes being traced into the corpse, vital organs exploding as long, blade-like nails punctured them.

            Fueled in an animalistic way (as only a were-creature in the throes of the full -blown Rage that comes with the first shift can be) by the sight, smell, taste, feel of blood, Lyrica turned on her biological mother, who, at the first sight of the Crinos werecat, had fallen into Delirium, and was completely oblivious as to what had happened.  Attacking with blinding speed, Lyrica tore her mother into so many bloody chunks, littering the floor with her severed limbs and various assortment of body parts.  

            Yowling her hatred in the feral tongue of a Raging were-creature, Lyrica flung herself through the small window of the apartment, and fell three floors down, tumbling and flailing through the air, only to land perfectly on the pavement below.  Then she ran, blindly, into the night; the path of property destruction that trailed her the only marker that she had ever passed, both obvious and inexplicable.  The damage was quickly repaired by city maintenance workers, the murder of Frank and Margie Rosenberg filed under "unknown causes," and Lyrica Margeaux Grey, at least in that corner of the city of Necropolis, was forgotten about entirely by people who never really knew that she had once existed.


	3. Chapter One: Gathering the Pack

**Volume One: **Gathering the Pack****

Chapter One: Six Years Later

It was late Friday night, or early Saturday morning, depending on how one views the time 12:03.  Lyrica Grey had worked about halfway up a large, crystalline, mirrored structure in the center of the City of Necropolis for about three weeks now; E.Y.E. Tech Industries, a multi-billion dollar corporation, specializing in the marketing, manufacturing, and research of the cutting-edge computer technology of the 21st century.  (The acronym "E.Y.E." stood for "Electronic Youth Engineering" as many of the employees at E.Y.E. Tech were under thirty years of age.)  

The company itself was owned by one Jeff Markus, a twenty-three year old entrepreneurial genius, and a corporate entity in his own right.  The young Mr. Markus had built up his computary empire over the course of merely a few years, passing the billion dollar mark at the tender age of nineteen.  Money seemed to be his main objective, his goal in life, to be gained by any means possible; so much so that, as one of the many rumors among his colleagues said, to him, scruples were a type of Russian coinage, and morals were stylized Italian paintings on church walls.  He had made his fortune, enough to buy anything with the _interest_ that he could ever want over a dozen lifetimes.  And yet (as it was rumored among his colleagues) the man never seemed to be contented with his life.  Indeed, the few individuals who had seen him when he took off his sunglasses, which was rare, since he wore them constantly, even inside and at night, which only added to his chilly outward façade, said that, judging by the expression in his eyes, some horrible act of misfortune must have had befallen him at one point of his life (although there was no indication of what that was), for his eyes were an enigma: dead yet soul-searching, bland yet exhilarating, stoic yet terrifying.  And this was the self-professed cynical bastard, Jeff Markus; the man that Lyrica was employed under as his one of his many personal secretaries and typists.              

            Lyrica had done remarkably well since the night of her first change.  She barely remembered what had happened at first, only that she had woken up in a hospice for the abused, wayward and homeless; brought in by a kind, elderly lady who had found her on the street, unconscious and covered with an unusual amount of blood.  Afterward, her mind began to recollect bits and pieces of what had happened, although most of it remained blurred and fuzzy in the nebulous corners of her subconscious, only to resurface in her dreams.

            _It was still there; the armor of her nightmares, simmering just below the surface of her skin, ready at any time, should she need _It_, to spring forth and destroy.  _It_ was always waiting, although she had to use _It_ very few times since that first shift, and then __It was never as powerful or consuming as __It had been that night, although _It_ was still decimating.  Lyrica, with all of her research, had never realized what _It_ was, so she simply called _It _"__It," and she hated __It, and herself for her ignorance._

Time had also changed Lyrica physically.  The tall, thin, undernourished child she had been was gone; it had been replaced by the newer, sleeker model, one that was less angular and more rounded.  This twenty-two year old version of Lyrica was not the classic beauty seen in paintings and movies, but enigmatically eye-catching; something that she would never understand.  Of course she was still very pale, no amount of time spent in a tanning salon would ever change that, though she had tried; her hair was still jet black, and the back was still short, cut at about chin lever, but Lyrica had grown the very front out a good six inches longer, and had cut it at a diagonal, until it had met the back.  And of course, her lips were still very scarlet, and her eyes were still very, _very_ amethyst.  

It was what was _behind her eyes that had changed the most.  Purple eyes stared out at the world from underneath a curtain of short, black bangs, but with the haunting expression of ones that had seen too much and gone to far.  As in her youth, people avoided her as though she had some sort of social disease, as though they subconsciously sensed that she was different.  Lyrica realized this, but liked to believe that she did not care.  It was a game, she knew, the Normalcy Game, and she was an unwitting player._

But, at present, Lyrica was with the twenty-page Wandsworth report at her computer terminal, which was overdue and taking up most of her head.  She quickly skimmed what she had written, checked another row of figures; then noticed that page seventeen had vanished, and she set it up to print out again, and another page down, and she knew that if she were only left alone to finish it, she could be out of there and home asleep by one o'clock, and rest all weekend.

"I'm just glad that there's no one else here to distract me," Lyrica informed her glowing computer screen tiredly, "Not that I really enjoy talking to the assholes that work here, but they seem to be on some type of asinine mission to...well, who knows what the hell they want to do, but it involves screwing around with me, that's all I need to understand."  She smoothed the plaid skirt that was under her dark jacket, and that covered her fishnet tights and boots that covered her lower leg, with a superior air.  She had already been warned once about dressing like that at the office, for it was a professional place, full of professional people, who wore professional clothes and professional shoes while at their chosen profession, but Lyrica did not really care.  This was how she felt comfortable dressing, so she continued to dress like a slightly sadistic schoolgirl of a sort, all plaid and leather and black.

Downstairs, the janitor slopped more soapy water onto the marble floors of the building, cursing the man who had invented menial labor.  Behind her, the soft light emanating from Jeff Markus' office was abruptly flicked off, and the doors slid open with a silent _whoosh_.  A lone figure emerged from the room, shadowy, indiscriminate.  Lyrica, however, was too involved with her work to notice the activity.  _And two more pages down, _she thought, _so that leaves only one more page...._

A soft coughing noise from behind her nearly made Lyrica jump out of her skin.  Whirling around, she soon discovered the source of the noise, none other than her employer, Mr. Jeff Markus himself.  A flicker of emotions ran across her face rapidly, quiet anger and annoyance for being interrupted, surprise that Mr. Markus was pausing behind her as if he wanted to talk, as if she were important, even a slight bit of fear at the fact that he _was_ paying attention to her.  Jeff was a tall individual, one of those cool types that seemed to be holding themselves aloof and above everyone else.  His favorite color, judging by the wardrobe he wore while at the office, was black; all of his nice Armani suits were black, as well as his trench coat, boots, socks, and, presumably, underwear.  Even his accessories, the small earrings he wore, were made out of a dark platinum metal.  Jeff was not a large-built man, but was, nonetheless, very muscular.  Long hair, the color of coffee with no cream added, framed his face, hanging down his back in a thin ponytail.  Jeff wore his hair long because it made people feel uncomfortable that his hair was so long, and Jeff liked making people feel uncomfortable.

_His glasses are off_, thought Lyrica to herself.  In the light of the computer, Jeff's eyes appeared to be soulless black oildrops balancing on snow-white orbs that would, every so often, dart to all the shadowy corners of the room, as though they were searching for unseen enemies that were biding their time until he was off-guard.  They were cold, calculating; eyes like little machines; adding, subtracting, evaluating; expecting anything and everything.  Lyrica experienced a brief twinge of fear, and then found herself wondering if the man was quite sane.

"And what the hell do you want...um, _sir?" she asked sarcastically.  _At 12:23 at night, after staring at the same screen for about fifteen hours_, she reasoned, _I can be a little bitchy; in fact, I almost deserve to be_.  Jeff looked at her, arching an eyebrow as a gesture to show his apparent disbelief at her question, but seemed to have an almost-smirk playing at the corners of his mouth.  He quickly ran through the names of the employees he had most recently hired, trying to remember this girl's name.  _It had started with an "L,"_ he reminded himself.  Leslie?  Lauren?  No, that did not sound right.  It was more poetic.  Then....              _

"Lyrica.  Lyrica Grey, correct?  I hired you three weeks ago to fill a job vacancy in my clerical staff, because one of your former colleagues was promoted.  One of your many  qualifications was that you were bilingual, and you can also type 107 words a minute with no errors."  Jeff recalled the facts with no amount of smugness or pride, it was simply how his mind worked.  After thinking about it for a few nanoseconds, he remembered that he had hired Lyrica Grey not because of her qualifications, but because there was something about her, something fleetingly familiar, but that something evaded his grasp, as though he were trying to harness the wind.

"Well, I'm impressed.  Do you keep all of your employees filed away by type, or am I the exception?"  While she spoke, Lyrica turned back to her computer terminal, finished the last page with a few deft keystrokes, and printed.  When the little machine was finished expelling the final sheet of paper, Lyrica collected them all and filed them under "W," ready to go out Monday morning.  She depressed the button that cut power to the monitor, then turned back to Jeff and retrieved her overcoat from the back of the chair.  Jeff had not moved at all, just stood there watching her. Or if he had moved, Lyrica had not noticed.

"What do you need, _sir?" she asked after a long pause in which neither party did anything except stare at the other.  Jeff continued to hold her violet eyes with his black ones.  _Yes,_ he thought, _something there, just beneath the surface...._  He shook his head a few times, as if to reassure himself that it was nothing.  The attack, he had to focus on the ambush tonight.  _If my source is reliable, that is....__

"What are still doing here, Miss Grey?" he asked after great length.

"What am I _doing_?  What the hell does it _look like I'm doing?  I'm working, that's what.  You think these reports and letters to your clients write themselves?"  Lyrica, more than a little pissed off, turned to leave.  Moving quickly, Jeff intercepted her path to the elevator.  It was his policy to at least try to behave like a gentleman to all women, even the real bitches like this Lyrica was turning out to be.          _

"You must be exhausted, judging by your attitude.  I hope this is not how you would ordinarily act towards your employer; or perhaps _this_ is why you have gotten yourself fired twenty-one times in the past three years."  She glared at him; he ignored her and continued.  "If you do not think it to be an imposition, would you mind if I walked you to your car?  It will be dark in the parking garage, and I would not like anything to happen to one of my employees in my building."  She continued to stare at him, apparently still upset, but then, to Jeff's surprise, Lyrica relented, her expression softening slightly, mouth turning up in a small smile.                          

"You're right; I am a little tired.  Sorry about that.  If you want to walk with me for a little bit, I guess that would be alright."  She pushed passed him and made her way to the elevator that would take her down to the parking level.  Jeff followed her.  The ambush, his mind said to him; what about the ambush?  _Later_, he told it.  _Besides, the information has an eighty-three percent chance of being incorrect, by my calculations, so why should I concern myself with it?_

Lyrica pushed a button on the glowing panel of the elevator, and the pulleys controlling the elevator quietly started to release the cable that would allow the box to descend.  Jeff reached onto his coat pocket, and pulled out a pack of Clove Blacks and lighter.  Feeling Lyrica's eyes on him, he turned to her.  

"Do you mind if I smoke?" he asked, a little more politeness edging into his voice than the occasion called for.  Lyrica just rolled her eyes.

"Go for it," she said, not caring; wishing she could do the same, but, due to limited funding, Lyrica had not been able to purchase a pack this week.  However, she felt it was a sign of, well, not weakness, but something quite similar to it.  They got off the elevator at ground level and walked across the deserted plain of the empty parking lot.  The parking structure smelled like all parking structures smell: like impatience, with a hint of gasoline and car engine mixed in.  The harsh streetlights illuminated portions of the garage, but also created black shadows.  Near the back wall, creating a small splotch of color in the endless monotony of the asphalt-colored sea, was a blue motorcycle.  Jeff paused when he saw it, but Lyrica kept walking.  When she noticed he was not with her anymore, she turned back to see where he had fallen behind at.

"Is that your bike?" he asked.  She nodded, a sense of pride growing in her.

"That is my 2000 Yamaha XT350 Dual Sport Motorcycle.  You know anything about bikes?"

"A little," Jeff said, more than modestly, for he knew a great deal about motorcycles and automobiles, "I have a Yamaha XT350 similar to this one, except in black."  Lyrica smiled.  She loved her bike; it was a birthday present from herself to herself a few years ago, when she was working as a telephone operator for that law firm.  Immediately after buying the Yamaha, she perfected the art of tearing around town on it, going top-speed, in one of her little skirts.  It was not as difficult as it sounded; Lyrica simply had to remember to tuck the cloth underneath her legs before she started.  Impressed that Jeff appeared to actually know something about motorcycles, she started to ask him which make of bike was his favorite, when she noticed the expression on his face.  He appeared to be sniffing the air, testing it for an elusive scent, as though he were some type of humanoid canine.  Apparently Jeff had not found what he was searching for, because he untensed his muscles and appeared to relax a bit.

"What was _that about?" asked Lyrica.  Jeff looked at her, an answer forming on his lips, but he never got to say it.  The attack came suddenly from the shadows on his left, an attack in the form of a huge muscled wall of pure human evil: a fomor.  The fomor tackled Jeff, throwing him up against the wall with enough force to leave a good-sized dent.            _

"Well, well," said the fomor, smiling with teeth that looked like an accident in a graveyard, "You are Mr. Data-Compression, I assume?"  _So_, he thought,_ the informant had been correct._  Jeff grinned, momentarily, as if at some private joke of his own.  He had always enjoyed battling fomori, and this one seemed especially moronic.           

"You assume correct.  Just so you know, the one handgun is in my belt holster, and the other one is in my boot.  Feel free to use them if you forgot yours."  Fomori were twisted humans, one of the minions of the Wyrm, the evil, corrupt member of the Triat.  Often their deformities included extra or missing limbs, large amounts of flesh hanging from various body parts, or the ability to produce harmful, often fatal, chemicals from sacs inside their bodies, enabling them to spit venom.  They derived their pleasures from destroying the earth, poisoning Gaia, the mother of all were-creatures.  

Jeff was still grinning at the fomor, like a starving panther sighting a lost peasant child, when he noticed that the fomor seemed to be multiplying itself.  There were suddenly two of them, and then four, no, _five fomori, each deformed creature standing in a pose-guts posture, ready to do great and glorious battle for their corrupt master, venomous tongues lolling out of their mouths, sinewy third and fourth arms flexing and twisting, the gelatinous masses under their wet or flaking skin roiling and seething. _

Slightly unnerved and out-numbered, the smile fading from his face, Jeff told himself that he should have accepted Johnny's or Max's offers for help.  He had discussed the rumor of ambush with both of his pack mates, and, though they had tried to desperately to convince him of the contrary, he had held firm to his resolve that he did not need them, although he told them it was because there would be a lesser risk of death this way.  Now, however, Jeff was silently cursing himself and his pride that had told him to refuse assistance. 

The fomori encircled him, locking him into a small cage of flesh, body hair, and the horrific stench of death, decay, and unwashed body parts.  Jeff, an almost-obsessively fastidious individual, felt himself grow nauseated, his stomach muscles forcing back down what little he had eaten that day.  Underneath his unshakable exterior, Jeff could feel himself grow a little more than apprehensive, his skin beginning to crawl, but that only heightened his determination to handle this situation on his own.  

Taking a deep, calming breath, he found that small node of his mind, the one that possessed the powers he needed, and _changed_.  His body went through the practiced actions quickly and smoothly, and in all actuality, quite suddenly; dedicated clothing melting into his body.  Jeff was gone, and in his place was a creature that few had ever glimpsed, and that even fewer would remember; a creature whose very appearance would have put the Egyptian jackal-headed god Anubis to shame.  Jeff was gone, and in his place, was a creature known in popular mythology as "werewolf," known in select societies, the so-called experts on lycanthropy, as _loup-garoux; _but, among themselves, are called simply Garou, the most powerful of all of Gaia's creations.

In his Crinos form, the form that is, exactly, one-half human, and one-half wolf, Jeff was easily eight feet tall, and almost every inch of his frame was furred with a dark gray hair, (the exceptions being his eyes, inside of his ears, nose, mouth, and the paw-like pads on his hands, for the obvious reasons).  His sleek, slate-colored coat was accentuated by the silvery highlights.  Jeff was an Ahroun, born under that full moon auspice, (an "auspice" is the phase of the moon under which a particular Garou was born, commonly thought to determine or influence certain personalities or traits).  Ahroun was the warrior auspice; those born on a night of the full moon were generally powerful Garou with a propensity to want to fight.  It had taken Jeff a long time to maintain the cool he commonly showed in battle, however, every time it was a struggle.  

Jeff dropped his eight foot Crinos self into a defensive posture, the former pretense of self-assured apathy gone, his self-preservation instinct surfacing.  A low growl escaped from his wolf-like muzzle, so deep that the very floor of the concrete parking structure itself started quivering.  The fomori smiled their terrible smiles, exposing their ruined teeth and gums, their deformed and added limbs also taking up defensive poses, their minds set on destroying this worthless Garou.  

"Alright, you fomori mother-fuckers!  You want to play?  Fine, let's play!"  Jeff launched himself at their leader, the fomor that had first spoken to him.  The fomor laughed, unhealthily, dirtily, and pulled back one knotted, gnarled fist.  The fist swung quickly in the direction of Jeff's stomach, but at the very last possible second, the werewolf moved, rolling under the fomor's fist and scissoring his legs between his adversary's, toppling the ugly human.  Baring his fangs, Jeff tried to close his mouth around the jugular vein of the fomor's neck, as all of his wolf instincts were telling him to do, but two more fomori grabbed him, hoisting him through the air and down onto his back.  Suppressing the urge to yell in pain, for he had gone through far worse in other battles, Jeff flipped himself back on his feet, growling a challenge to his next assailant, whoever or whatever that would be.

Another fomor ran towards him, yelling out a stream of fomor obscenities before propelling herself through the air, landing square in the middle of Jeff's chest.  A rib snapped under the pressure of her weight, and Jeff pushed back with his own body weight, throwing the female to one side, but throwing himself forward, off-balance, onto his knees.  The werewolf known, by friend and foe alike, as Data-Compression, smiled briefly, knowing that the remarkable regenerative abilities of his Crinos form were already working, the shattered bone repairing itself swiftly and perfectly.  

Again, Jeff hauled himself up to his feet, repressing the urge to breathe heavily.  He paused momentarily to regain his breath; his heart pounding a primeval rhythm in his chest, keeping time with the fast-paced pulse of the battle.  But his attackers did not pause; instead, the fomori regrouped and launched another attack at their supposed prey.  The lead fomor leaped for Jeff's neck, swiping at it with a long clawed, furred third arm.  Fortunately, for Jeff's neck, who rather enjoyed being a part of Jeff, the fomor's aim was low; instead of removing the Garou's voice box, all four claws ripped long abrasions into his chest.  Hot wolf blood splattered onto the pavement, the chill night air creating steam over the dark scarlet pools, as Jeff staggered back clutching the wounds on his torso.  The fomor laughed once, loudly, the noise reverberating around the parking garage.  Jeff's injuries continued to ooze red, which greatly concerned him.  _Why aren't they healing?  My body should be repairing itself by now.  _His train of thought trailed off as Jeff noticed the all-too-familiar glint of streetlight reflecting off the fomor's silver-plated claws.  Silver claws that, when wounding a werewolf allergic to that particular metal, would force the injuries to heal the normal way, with no interference from the incredible healing capabilities that came with the Crinos form.    

_Damn, _he thought, _why do I always insist on doing things my own way?  If I just had one other person on my team, I could stand a chance of surviving this with only minor injury to myself.  But, no, instead, I am alone again, save for that idiot human girl_- his train of thought suddenly slammed to a stop as he remembered Lyrica.  Again cursing himself, this time for his own shortcomings, he allowed himself to scan the parking garage, simultaneously sniffing the air to try to figure out where that girl went.  Jeff could not see her, but could clearly smell the fact that Lyrica had hidden herself behind a large cement support structure.

Just as he realized this, one fomor stopped, and it, too, started inhaling the petroleum-scented air for some indefinable scent.  Although Jeff knew that a fomor's nose was nowhere near the equal of a Garou's nose, this fomor seemed fully capable of catching the scent of a normal human.  The fomor snorted, and then turned to its leader.

"There's someone else here," it said simply, darting one hand behind a cement support structure.  It returned with what was, to Jeff, one very frightened human girl named Lyrica Grey.  The fomor roughly shoved its captured prey to the ground, sending Lyrica sprawling face-first into the rough asphalt, a small cry escaping her lips as she hit.  _Well, _Jeff thought dispassionately, _at least she should be in the full stages of Delirium right now, so if she lives, she won't remember anything, and if she dies… she is just human, anyway._

The fomor who had caught Lyrica kicked her once, roughly, in the stomach, then picked her up, brought her face up to his, suddenly cracking their foreheads together with a bone-jarring _thwack_.  Another fomor grabbed the girl by her shoulder and threw her bodily into the nearby cement post.  Jeff felt himself becoming angrier; for even a human does not deserve to get murdered in cold blood by fomori, not while he was around.

"Hey, assholes!" he shouted into the night, through his wolf-muzzle, "You came here to fight _me_, correct?  Stop playing with that _worthless_ creature, and let's get on with it!"  The fomori ignored him, intent on pissing him off even more by pretending that Jeff was an insignificant insect.  Their intentions were gratified almost immediately; the werewolf threw himself into the nearest fomor, sending both himself and his target flying. They hit the floor simultaneously, tumbling off into different directions.  Jeff felt his maimed torso start to throb, every inch of his wounds objecting to the battle that he was engaging in.  Jeff ignored them.  

The other four fomori stared at Jeff and their companion, momentarily ignoring Lyrica, bent on encircling him, not allowing him to escape.  Jeff eyed the fomori warily, and hoped he had given her the time that she needed to get away, and felt slightly elated when she picked herself up and climbed unsteadily to her feet.  The feeling quickly passed when he noticed that she was not leaving.  On the contrary, Lyrica just stood there, staring intently and blindly at the fomori and Jeff, looking at them and through them.  _What's wrong with you?  _Jeff yelled at her with his mind, while blocking the punch aimed for his face, his injuries becoming number with every passing minute.  _Don't just stand there; move!  Do something!_  Lyrica was sweating coldly, her hands shaking, her eyes closed.  A thin trickle of blood exited her mouth, a wine-colored river that ran slowly from her lips, and traced the line of her jaw down onto her throat, where it pooled in her clavicle.  A huge bruise was forming on the right side of her face.  Her already pale skin seemed even more pallid; her breath coming in ragged gasps and sobs.  Jeff thought that she was in the throes of Delirium, the half-mad state that humans find themselves in upon seeing a were-creature in its Crinos form.         

Her eyes suddenly snapped open, the vivid, plum-colored pools wide with fright; fright, noted Jeff, but not Delirium.  _But that isn't possible!  There is no way that a normal human can fight off the state of Delirium for this long.  Is there?  _Almost as if in response to his unspoken question, Lyrica started screaming, a horrible scream, the kind that could freeze a person's blood, and drive through their head like a new power drill with a bone-saw attachment.  A primeval, gut-wrenching scream that sang of beings long forgotten, beings that supposedly only existed in the realm of fairy tales and the delusional. 

She knew what she had to do, and _It_ scared her.  _It_, the horrible self of her nightmares, the purveyor of her greatest fears.  _It_ had to reveal _It_self to the fomori demons that threatened her very existence.  But Lyrica was terrified with the thought of the changing into _It_, so much so that, despite her best efforts to control _It_, _It_ staved off Lyrica's human half long enough to force a change onto her fragile human form, to let her revert to her seldom-traversed feline embodiment once more.

Jeff stared at Lyrica for a handful of heartbeats, each one pounding through his skull, as though he were composed entirely of a percussion section of an orchestra.  His obsidian eyes grew round, and his jaw slacked open, for he knew what he was seeing, but did not know how it was possible.  _A Bastet.  She's turned into a Bastet, _he thought, wildly.  Madly.  _And one half-hour ago, she was just an insignificant human, an office temp.  _Lyrica's arms and legs grew long and muscled, paw-like hand releasing claws from their clutches.  Tail forcing itself through the skin, head taking the shape of her more felinic ancestors, and night-like hair sprouting from her skin, Lyrica completed her transformation in a matter of seconds; her clothing performing its own transformation, turning into ripped and tattered rags.  Lowering her head, Lyrica let a low growl escape from her mouth, starting from the depths of her stomach, and let it rise in pitch, until it was an otherworldly yowl from the back of her throat.

The troupe of fomori created an encompassing ring around the newest threat of the early morning, a half-Frenzied Bastet.  Jeff, a little more than startled, fell back, his practically computerized mind taking stock of the situation.  The werecat propelled herself towards the fomori, claws extended fully, open mouth bearing fangs, ready to strike for the kill.  Latching onto the nearest fomor's neck with her long canine teeth, Lyrica tore at the tough-yet-delicate, warped human flesh with a snarl.  The fomor wrenched the female Bastet from its throat with the long, malformed third arm sprouting out of its back, splintered nails plowing long bloody furrows into Lyrica's upper arm.  She cried out against the pain as the twisted human hurled her into the fist of the female fomor, the one that had broken Jeff's ribs earlier in the battle. Lyrica fell back, hissing and spitting at the evil.  The female took the hissing to be a challenge, and flew at Lyrica with a screech of her own.  The cat warrior blocked the fomor with one hind leg, sending the evil human flying into Lyrica's motorcycle, which was parked near the wall, the small vehicle crumpling under the fomor's weight.

The leader of the fomori charged at Lyrica, mouth wide open, dripping with a putrid green venom that flew back as he ran.  Lyrica evaded his grasp with a surprising burst of speed, flipping her sinewy cat-body to one side, unfortunately, right into the arms of the two other fomori, who promptly took hold of the Bastet's many limbs, making sure that she was securely held in their grasp.  The other three fomori immediately began to assault her with their fists, treating her as though she were some sort of living punching bag.  Lyrica struggled in their grasp, but the pair of fomori held firm, their long nails digging into her arms painfully.  Limbs began to shatter from the rain of blows being poured down on them, one splintered bone tearing at the cat flesh, staining her black fur with sticky red blood that clumped and matted the surface.  And still, the fomori kept on, their intended quarry, the werewolf Jeff Markus, nearly forgotten in their drunken blood lust.

But Jeff was still there, his mind reeling from the fact that, in just a few seconds, this night had gone from bad to worse, far worse than he could have ever imagined.  Despite his chill exterior, he never liked it when innocent people got hurt; he liked it even less when the innocent party was not human, but a were-creature.  Various plans flew uselessly through his mind, none of them that would have worked.  _I need to distract their attention away from Lyrica Grey and back onto myself.  What could I do that would create a sufficient distraction, short of killing them?_  Jeff felt a small smile spreading across his face.  _Nothing!_  

One hand dropped immediately to the pistol strapped to his waist.  _Six bullets.  And one goes to the motorcycle, so that means five.  One for each.  Not much room for error.  It's a good thing, then, that I won't miss._  He brought the weapon up to bear and fired it, straight into the gas tank on what was left of Lyrica's motorcycle.  The small ball of metal ignited the gas, causing the entire contraption to explode into flame with an eardrum shattering detonation.  The fomori stared at the now-burning smashed motorcycle for approximately .03 seconds, and then turned back to their semi-conscious prey.  Jeff took aim, and fired.  The second bullet went right through the neck of the female fomor, and she fell with a bloody gurgling noise.  Her four remaining companions dropped Lyrica to the asphalt of the garage with a sickening thud, and started for Jeff.  Maintaining his cool, Jeff lined up his next shot, and let the bullet fly.  It forced itself right between the eyes of the next corpse, and escaped out the back of the skull, sending gray brain matter flying in all directions.  The next fomor caught his bullet right through the heart, ending its life quickly as the small chunk of heated metal tore through chambers and arteries.  

Only two were left, and one was the leader.  Narrowing his black wolf eyes, Jeff put the next bullet through the jaw of the fomor underling, the force of the impact driving the bullet straight through the spinal cord, the spot where the skull attaches.  The fomor fell backwards in a heap, its blood mingling with its companions'.  The fomor leader checked himself just then, and turned around to run.  Jeff aimed for the fleeing human evil and let the last bullet fly.  The leader turned back to face Jeff, the bullet embedding itself in his left leg rather than a vital part.  Letting an agonized yell escape his mouth, the last fomor again turned to go, hoping to make an escape into the night, so he could nurse his wounds and kill again.  But the Crinos Garou was not finished with him yet.  Moving almost blindingly fast, Jeff retrieved the other gun from his boot, aimed, and fired.  The bullet flew through the air, and then through the fomor leader's frontal lobe, killing him instantly.

Bringing the gun down, Jeff immediately turned his attention to the Bastet, Lyrica.  She was watching him with huge eyes full of fear.  Jeff realized he could see a silhouette of himself from the fire reflected in her eyes: a huge, blood-covered wolf-creature in a trench coat, ripped from fomori claws, eyes glittering with both a real and internal flame.  Dropping his Crinos form, Jeff became human again, and walked over to Lyrica, who was on still on the ground where the fomori had released her, trembling with fright and blood loss, still in her half-cat form.  

"Are you all right?  Lyrica?"  She continued to stare at him, and then, quite suddenly, collapsed, unconsciousness taking over her mind and body.  Her Crinos body melted away, revealing a thin human girl in torn clothing remnants, with horrible wounds all over her body.  Jeff picked her up carefully, cradling her in both arms like one picks up a child, and stood, and then, realizing that holding Lyrica like that made the claw wounds on his chest hurt even more, he readjusted her lifeless form.  Still slightly charged with adrenaline from the battle, but nonetheless capable of driving, Jeff walked with Lyrica over to his shiny black BMW, and opened the passenger-side door, depositing the bloody girl onto the leather seat.  He strolled nonchalantly over to his door and got in, pausing for a second to remove the depleted Clove cigarette from his mouth, flicking it away, put the key into the ignition, started the automobile and drove away.

The fomori bodies faded into the ground, their dark master, the Wyrm, calling back their energy to him, feeding off of their death and destruction.  And then there was nothing.   


End file.
